2. The next article of complaint was with respect to contraband goods. If gentlemen will consult the law of nations, they will find that the articles mentioned in the British Treaty are by the law of nations contraband articles. They will find that in all the treaties with Denmark and Sweden, Great Britain had made the same stipulation. Indeed, the gentleman had acknowledged that it was so stated by some writers on the law of nations; but he wished to derogate from the authority of those writers, in the same way as Mr. Genet, in his correspondence with Mr. Jefferson, had called them "worm-eaten folios and musty aphorisms;" to _Vattel_ might be added _Valin's_ Ordinances, a very respectable work in France. How, then, can the gentleman with truth say that we have deviated from the law of nations? 3. The last point which the gentleman took notice of was the provision article. There was no doubt that this Government would never allow provisions to be deemed contraband, except when going to a besieged or blockaded port. Though he made this declaration, yet it was but candid to acknowledge that this was stated by _Vattel_ to be the law of nations. [He read an extract from _Vattel_.] When this was stated by Lord Grenville to Mr. Pinckney, our then Minister in London, Mr. Pinckney acknowledged it to be so stated in _Vattel_, but very ingeniously argued that France could not be considered as in the situation mentioned in _Vattel_, since provisions were cheaper there than they were in England, and therefore the case did not apply. When our Envoy was sent to London, both parties were tenacious on this ground. Our Minister was unwilling to agree to this construction of the law of nations; but the British Minister insisted upon it, and if there had not been some compromise, the negotiation must have been broken off, and a war probably ensued. The result was, therefore, that, without admitting it to be the law of nations, it was agreed that where provisions were contraband by the law of nations, they should be paid for, but not confiscated, as the law of nations (admitting that construction) would have authorized. Therefore some advantage was secured to France, for if Great Britain had confiscated our vessels going to France with provisions, it would certainly have damped the ardor of our citizens employed in that commerce; but under this regulation our merchants were certain of being paid for their cargoes, whether they arrived in France or were carried into England. These were the three grounds of objection which the gentleman from Virginia had stated as grounds of complaint by the French against the British Treaty.